


Sticks and Stones

by ninnie_eats_chips



Series: Asymmetry [2]
Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Bullying, Childhood Trauma, Dark Past, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Headcanon, Heavy Angst, Made-Up Backstory, Young G'raha, children being violent toward one another how do I tag that, really really bad kids, referenced Miqo'te lore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-11
Updated: 2020-03-11
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:15:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23104576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ninnie_eats_chips/pseuds/ninnie_eats_chips
Summary: G’raha was brave. Too brave, and too smart for his own good, his father always said.That proved true as he executed his plan, setting his book on the sill of the open window. As he prepared to climb up and out, he looked back to see that each measure was in place to secure his escape....He knew not if he would eventually be caught in the act. However, as the little Miqo’te tucked the text under his arm, emitting a quiet grunt as he hoisted himself up, he thought; well, they’d be hard-pressed to stop him, by then.
Series: Asymmetry [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1539757
Comments: 1
Kudos: 34





	Sticks and Stones

**Author's Note:**

> *breathes into a paper bag*  
> I've never been more nervous to post a fanfic....
> 
> I don't know if this needs to be said, but everyone is entitled to their own headcanons about what G'raha's past was like and you can take this made-up story with a grain of salt. But still, this is the most not-following-canonical-events thing that I have written (for a canon character) so I'm anxious? And please do mind the tags. This isn't the sunniest thing I have written by far.  
> (And ofc I don't condone this behavior.)
> 
> This is a stand-alone oneshot about G'raha, so you don't need to have read anything else in this series. But if you're reading my longfic (Crystal Memories), this slots nicely between Chapter 7 & 8, which references his past.

G’raha was brave. _Too brave, and too smart for his own good,_ his father always said. 

That proved true as he executed his plan, setting his book on the sill of the open window. As he prepared to climb up and out, he looked back to see that each measure was in place to secure his escape.

His half-siblings were still asleep in their beds, as was his own very clever decoy. And with every chance that his father had fallen asleep in his study, it was far quieter to leave this way. He knew not if he would eventually be caught in the act. However, as the little Miqo’te tucked the text under his arm, emitting a quiet grunt as he hoisted himself up, he thought; _well, they’d be hard-pressed to stop him, by then._

It didn’t take G’raha long to scale the overgrowth of vegetation that creeped up the side of his home, cutting through the vegetable patch that belonged to the retired huntress next door and making the clearing past most of the residences. Like that, he was nimble and quiet and avoided confrontation wherever necessary. It was still early enough in the morning that cold dew smattered the legs of his trousers, the chill on the wind tickling his nose as he made for a favorite reading spot close by the river. G’raha knew he wasn’t meant to venture that far alone, but there was an excitement in his belly as he sprinted there. He was sure enough that nothing would befall him before he either decided to return or was collected for breakfast and lessons. And if some of the more unruly children came by, he would keep his distance.

Curled up against the bark, G’raha began reading as the morning sun warmed him, flitting through rustling boughs across the pages. He wasted an hour in comfortable quietude, lost in the other world that books provided before the noise of the real world piqued his interest.

On the other side of the river, a small group of children had shown up to play, appearing to joust and swing sticks at one another in a mock-battle of sorts. 

“This time I’ll be the Nuhn, and you challenge me!”

Stubby ears swiveled as he couldn’t help but watch them. It was a common game that Seeker children played, and not one that G’raha was overly interested in himself, but still. A pang of jealousy formed as the desire to join them in their games grew.

_‘Do not stare,’_ the sagely advice of his elders rang inside G’raha’s head, and then those curious ears turned backward. He was old enough now to understand that these words had little to do with common politeness, and _everything_ to do with the uncommon coloration of his right eye. He held his book a little higher, lowering his face and attempting to push his hair in front of his eye while he observed them.

His father had told him a little about those that settled on that side of the river; calling themselves the ‘Ga’ tribe, and keeping little association with their kin on the other side. He knew that this area used to be his father’s land before he had relinquished it as a sign of goodwill, or something like that—and he was allowed to wade in the shallow streams, but never to cross to far onto the other side, or to follow it upstream.

But beyond that, G’raha had never seen these children before. The two boys in the group looked to be about his age, maybe a little older. Bigger than he, at least, but then so were most of his brethren from the G tribe.

They looked fun, though. Not like the type to cause a ruckus at the first sight of him, and were notably careful about where they poked their sticks as the little girl with them cheered one of them on. Perhaps if they didn’t know about him or his eye, they would let him play with them, just for a little while?

G’raha kept his nose pressed in his book while he considered it.

_‘It won’t be like the last time. It won’t.’_

No… The last incident was his foolishness. When G’raha heard his only friend had been bedridden with illness, he’d climbed through the window with an armful of his own books—especially the stories he thought the boy would like. He was happy to bring them, having learned how dreadfully bored he was. However, G’raha was aware that his friend’s family was not so approving of _his._ The moment he was discovered, he was chased out. His _“friend”_ did nary a thing to defend him, even _blamed him,_ and as soon as he had left, G’raha knew that bridge had been burned. Even in his attempted act of kindness, trespassing was trespassing. And for that, G’raha had received a reluctant spanking from his father. 

Such had been most of his _“friendships”_ so far, and for long he was content to a lonely childhood buried in books and enriched with a deep learning at least he could say none outside his family would have. Playing with one’s siblings was… _playing with one’s siblings._ And of them, being the youngest of four (that he counted among his father’s children), doing any sort of activities with them was not as satisfying as it should’ve been. It was hard enough just to include him, considering that it meant no one else would want to join in. Waiting for someone to take him outside was something he had grown too impatient for.

G’raha rocked back and forth with his face in those same pages and made a noise of dissatisfaction, of restlessness. If they saw him now, he was sure they’d already think him a freak. His mind urged him to stay put and be a good son, and be back in his room in time for breakfast. But his limbs ached to _run and play,_ especially as the Ga children tired of the same old play fighting and suggested playing adventurers instead. 

_This was a new bridge, ripe with opportunity and the potential for adventure..._

The small Miqo’te inhaled and then released his anxiety in the next breath, folding the corner of the page he left off on before leaving it in the shade. G’raha walked more quickly at first, then as he approached the small bridge of wooden planks, he slowed his footsteps, keeping his ears and tail down. When the wood creaked a little under his foot, the group of children turned to see him. He raised his hand in greeting and showed them a weak smile to convey that he meant no harm.

“Hello there,” he said, doing his best to speak up as he had been taught. He remained at a distance, stopping three-fourths of the way across the bridge when the girl was the first to answer with a greeting of her own, curling her fingers in a shy sort of wave back.

“Hello. Do you want to play with us?” She asked. For a moment, the kind greeting set him at ease and G’raha was able to lower his defenses. 

But no sooner than the question left her lips had the taller of the two boys crossed their arm protectively in front of the girl’s chest. From the look of their matching dusty brown hair, and one matching eye each, he presumed the boy to be her older brother.

“What do you want?” 

G’raha’s heart sank along with his ears. He opened his mouth for several seconds and could not find the words. Still, he closed his mouth, then opened it again. _He just needed the strength to persevere. He just had to show them he was nice and just like everyone else._

“I-I would indeed like to play with you, if that’s alright?”

The shorter boy looked to the taller—the assumed leader of this group, who then gave him a dirtier look than he had been giving before.

“You can _never_ play with us,” he spat. “My Da says you’re cursed. Shouldn’t you know that already?”

G’raha balled his fists, nibbling his lip to contain his hurt. _His anger,_ at being treated with more of the same despite being so open. _What exactly did he do wrong? Why did everyone’s parents tell their children that, about he and his father…?_

He should have known better than this, right? He would be scolded for this. He should have walked away rather than try this again, or trying to reason with them.

“I’m… I’m not cursed! ‘My eye is a gift… and one day I’ll know what to do with it.’ Th-that’s what my father told me!”

“Oh, really?” The boy scoffed. “Did _he_ know what to do with it? Tch, why do you think _we’re_ over here, and _you’re_ over there?”

G’raha gasped and took one step backward.

_That couldn’t be true, could it really? The reason why some of his tribe had finally decided to leave…?_

He remained frozen still, even as the other came closer, his counterpart following not too far behind as he pointed his stick at him. Up close, it was even easier to see why the brunette’s friends chose to follow him. He looked strong, and as he assumed an offensive stance, G’raha found he took on a completely different face. Had he really misjudged the boy so terribly?

The leader narrowed his eyes and then said venomously, “It’s because you red-eyed freaks won’t just die off already! And they still let the likes of you be Nuhns anyway!”

G’raha was speechless. He was speechless and he wanted to cry. He had been regarded as more intelligent than children like this, and knew that words were just that; _just words._ But they _hurt._ He couldn’t compel himself to turn and walk away, as would’ve been the smarter thing to do. As he would’ve been praised for doing, despite the circumstances. 

“Why bother with him? He doesn’t understand,” the other one added coldly.

_Why?_ He just wanted to be _someone’s_ friend, but that was never going to happen. He opened his mouth and shouted through the heavy lump in his throat.

“That land belonged to the Nuhns of the G tribe, and my father could take it back if he wanted to! You didn’t earn it! And if what you said is true, then you’re over there because you’re immoral and you deserve to be by yourselves! _You_ deserve to be punished! Not us!!” G’raha took a deep, shaky breath and decided to loose all of his frustrations on the one who was right in front of him, and screamed. “ _The lot of you!! Are all!!_ **_Awful!!”_ **

He had made the further mistake of coming closer, word by word. By then he had dug himself deep enough to know what was coming, only once it was too late to reverse and take it all back. The other children wouldn’t have known what it meant to be ‘immoral,’ nor would they likely ever see themselves as such.

“It’s ours now because _we_ _took it, you little daemon!!”_ The bigger, strong-looking boy, now in G’raha’s face, snatched at his arm and managed to grapple him before he swiped back. He managed to scratch the boy’s face and out of the corner of his eye, the girl had turned tail and yelped, running back to the settlement while G’raha had momentarily broken free, sprinting in the other direction.

He had never meant to get into a scuffle. It wouldn’t have been his first, _or last—_ but again, in the absence of strength to overpower his enemies, G’raha found himself running away with a heart full of fear, and eyes filled to the brim with hot tears. They chased him with sticks, while he had nothing. He scrambled for the tree on the other side of the water and G’raha was fast, but apparently, the other boys were faster. He had had rocks thrown at him before and could dodge them just well enough, but the elder had already lashed him with his stick before ditching it, and had no trouble at all tackling him to the ground with his might.

“You came to _our_ _side_ and insulted us! Tried to carry your plague over to us!”

He squirmed and shouted in honest denial, but could do no more than lift his wrists for more than a second before they were pinned down again. In his peripheral vision, the shadow of the brunette’s cohort loomed over him, still holding his own stick.

“Well, I’ll defend what’s rightfully ours from the likes of you! I ought to make your red eye black!!”

The next few seconds were a painful blur. It felt like a long time, having the weight of this boy on him, and for a mercy, G’raha’s attacker had only gotten a couple hits in before a familiar voice, mature and just deep enough to strike fear into the children that were terrorizing him. It was enough to make the leader clamber off, and for his friend to drop his stick before he ever had the chance to hit him with it.

_“Are you where you’re supposed to be?”_ Was all the man had to ask to get their tails between their legs. Or at least, they would have been, had they been long enough. The boys took one look back and forth between them, matching face to face before they began backing off in the direction of the river.

G’raha didn’t need to look to know that it had been his father come to save him, as shameful as the fact was. _He felt shameful. For everything._

“You shame your tribe.” And like that, their boots couldn’t beat fast enough to carry them away.

What would they know of shame? He was the one who laid sprawled on the ground with a bloody cheek from being hit with a stick, eye hurting just enough that it may as well have been black. For a moment G’raha sat in silence, save for his crying into his knees, pulled up against his chest. His ear twitched at his father’s deep sigh, and the moment he spoke _“Raha,”_ he had scampered for the tree. His foot slipping once on the bark in his state of upset, it didn’t take him long to claim a branch with which to brood on.

~~~~~

“Pray come down, son. I wish to speak to you,” G’raha’s father asked, but the small Miqo’te kept his back turned to him and didn’t answer.

The former Nunh knew his son to be… difficult, this way. He faced challenges of prejudice that no other Seekers had to face, save that of his own paternal bloodline. Adding to that, _he was still a child,_ and was of course, prone to doing childish things. Coupling that with G’raha’s tendencies toward being stubborn… it made him almost _difficult_ to comfort. 

Getting G’raha down, for the time being, would be unlikely. His father would have to be indirect with his method of comfort.

Noticing the lone book left under the tree, the man had gone to pick it up and began leafing through curiously. He didn’t quite like doing things this way, but left with no choice, he waited for the hushed sniffling to all but cease on its own before he spoke again.

“Fancied yourself a bit of reading before our lessons, did you?” A glance up into the tree revealed G’raha’s ears to be perking up, the left one twitching at the sound of the pages turning. He was listening.

When he came across the dog-eared page that G’raha had left, he couldn’t help but frown, rumpling his facial hair.

“Did I not tell you to treat your books with more respect?” Ignored, again.

“... Ahem. I must admit, it was very clever of you to fill your bed with popotoes…”

Like father, like son, perhaps, but the man was soon rubbing the bridge of his nose with impatience. He tried asking once more, “Will you not come down, Raha? I know you are hurt… I’ll not spank you, if that’s what you are concerned about.” Finally he paused, sighed again through his nostrils, and was frank.

“I wish to talk with you some more about our Allagan Eye.”

“I do not.”

~~~~~

“I don’t care about Allag. I don’t care about the eye.”

It was the furthest from what he wanted to talk about, or think about, right now. His father had to understand that if he had been through similar things, as well as his grandfather before him. 

His eye was hurting, and for the moment he couldn’t discern whether that was just from being punched or the unexplainable, stinging ache that sometimes crept into his red eye. Quite possibly both. G’raha clutched it anyway. Added it to the list of reasons he wished he hadn’t been born with it, and thought of how he argued against it being some type of curse. Now he was the one who needed convincing... If it couldn’t have passed on to another unlucky brother or sister—no, that would be cruel… perhaps he wished he just hadn’t been born instead.

But maybe, just maybe, one day he would escape all this? Become an adventurer instead, and not just in silly children’s games? Always had that concept enticed him, made him brave enough to climb the tallest trees and leap down from them without fear of hurting himself. It was the concept of being free to roam about and do whatever he wanted, without anyone wanting to hurt him, to sling names, or to blame him for existing. One day, G’raha Tia would be his own leader, and no one would need to rescue him, whether that meant he would be alone until the very end or not.

_Yes,_ if he were a heroic adventurer, people would look at him differently. Having this Allagan Eye; a symbol of might from a long fallen empire wouldn’t mean as much, or anything, to the rest of the world as it did to his people—

G’raha’s head shot up when he heard the sound of a grunt, followed by crackling bark, some bits of wood splintering and breaking off until he saw his father emerge toward the large branch he’d been sitting on. He stared at him, wide-eyed in surprise and distracted from his sorrows while the man slowly tested the branch, making sure it would not come crashing down with his added weight. Then he gradually shifted onto the very base of it, leaning back to brace against the base of the tree itself.

“I thought you were too old to climb trees,” G’raha stared dumbfounded at his father’s grinning. Stray tears still streamed down his cheek until the man scooted carefully forward and dabbed at his face with a handkerchief he produced from his pocket. G’raha winced when he dabbed at the cut, then he turned away and lowered his face again.

“At least, that’s what you told me. But I suppose you lied to me… Just like you lied about… the ones over there.”

“I did not lie to you. I simply… did not tell the whole truth. I apologize.” The man took a deep breath in, then out. “And as for climbing trees, I may be older and bigger, but the instinct does not simply die out… neither does the instinct to care for my flesh and blood. Speaking of which, yours could use some attention.”

G’raha kept his head turned in the right direction, but he kept his eyes on the ground fulms below them. _“Ah,”_ he groaned and hissed when the cloth gently rubbed along the leaking wound. Eventually, he pushed his hand away. The branch was already creaking with the grown man overextending himself to reach him.

“You’re going to ruin the handkerchief.”

“I can replace it. I cannot replace you.”

The little Miqo’te stared contemplatively at his father for a long moment. He looked his face up and down. How they were a spitting image only some decades apart, from the sheen of their red hair to the one red and one cyan-colored eye. His grandfather had been the same, he remembered vaguely hearing, and he had the faintest memory of the wrinkled markings upon his face. G’raha tried to imagine his white hair being red like his at one point, and couldn’t.

… But his father was right, however literally he had meant to be. Unlike their hair color, of every child born in their line, the Allagan Eye was rare enough to occur only once. And by those odds, he assumed he could count himself lucky that he only needed to share his living space with three; a number his father seemed happy enough with that he resumed life as a hunting Tia. As well as a caretaker, when he was there.

Well, he already had what he wanted, didn’t he? His favorite, ill-fated son. In that regard, of course, _he could never be replaced._

He was an easy read to the man, as evidenced by the sympathetic noise he made when his expression turned downcast once more.

“You know I didn’t mean it the way you are thinking.”

For a long time, the pair sat wordlessly listening to the wind’s song brushing through the leaves, accompanied by the babbling of the low river and the birds chirping. Eventually, another song joined in that started off low at first, then grew in volume and emotion. Without meeting his gaze, G’raha listened to the familiar song of his ancestors. Even though he didn’t understand what any of it meant, much like he didn’t know what the future had in store for him—the lyrics managed to give him hope, and he found solace in his father’s voice. It was a song he could fall asleep to at night, and often did.

When it was over, G’raha, looking down between his dangling feet, prepared a question he must have asked a thousand times. Nevertheless, he was hopeful for a different answer this time, if even just slightly more than _“I don’t know.”_

“Father, what does it mean?”

He caught the corner of a smile, followed by a weak shrug.

“I am afraid the answer to that, as with the truth of our eye… all of it rests with Allag.”

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry Raha. ;;  
> Please at least tell me his dad was a good dad and not an absolute bastard who was really hard on him..
> 
> I'm sure you can tell which part one of my big writing quirks stepped in and blocked me out of someone's head in order to show the details the Writing Brain wants to see. Maybe someday I'll change it, but for now Writing Brain is the Master Brain and I can't touch that section. :l
> 
> Thank you for reading. <3


End file.
